College Democrats; Unacceptable U.S. exceptionalism

By Celest Grebe

In 2005, Jimmy Carter stated that "What has happened at Guantanamo Bay ... does not represent the will of the American people. I'm embarrassed about it; I think it's wrong. I think it does give terrorists an unwarranted excuse to use the despicable means to hurt innocent people." Unfortunately, vast numbers of Americans are ignorant of the extent of the human rights abuses that occurred and are occurring at Guantanamo Bay. Currently 270 people are being detained without charge, 12 of whom are children. However, the infringement upon Fourth Amendment rights is just the beginning - the United States government is violating their rights as human beings. A recent FBI report reveals many Guantanamo detainees were left shackled to the floor in the fetal position for more than 24 hours without food or water while being exposed to extreme temperatures. Furthermore, the report detailed the use of growling dogs to intimidate detainees. One detainee was found wrapped in an Israeli flag and bombarded with loud music for an extended period of time. Other human rights abuses include sleep deprivation, waterboarding, sexual degradation, forced drugging, humiliation and religious persecution. The torture techniques used at Guantanamo Bay are similar to the techniques used by communist China during the Korean War. As Americans, shouldn't we be better than 1950's communists?

Over the past seven years, we have silently allowed the Bush Administration to perpetuate gross human rights violations in our name. In doing so, we have become no better than those who stood by while the Nazis exterminated the Jews in Europe or those who sat idly when Japanese-Americans were unjustly interned here at home. The fact that those detained at Guantanamo Bay are being held without charge and, even worse, tortured at the hands of Americans diminishes our standing as a human rights supporter. The Supreme Court has ruled that the protections afforded by our Constitution apply to these detainees; however, the facility remains open with personnel using the same inhumane interrogation methods.

Even after these detainees are released, they continue to suffer from this mistreatment. Sixty-two released detainees were recently interviewed; two-thirds of those interviewed had suffered psychologically and emotionally since their release, all of them possessing the unwanted social stigma of being either a terrorist or a United States spy. Many come home to families who are in debt, wives who have divorced and remarried or the realization that they will never see their families again.

In May 2004, a group of released detainees told their stories to The Observer and wrote a letter to George W. Bush describing their torture. Within hours a U.S. military spokesman stated these stories were false. Not only had the United States unjustly detained and cruelly tortured these men for years, but he also blatantly called them liars. The Bush Administration has stated Guantanamo Bay must remain open in order to protect us from terrorists. Ironically, by trying to decrease terrorism through these detention facilities, we have actually accomplished the exact opposite. The families who the detainees leave behind are increasingly vulnerable to terrorist recruiters and often join the fight against the nation that wrongfully detained their father or brother. How do we expect other nations to adhere to the Geneva Conventions and respect human rights when we ourselves do not? If our enemies captured any American - military or civilian -would we want them treated in the same despicable manner as our Guantanamo detainees? Thankfully, President-elect Barack Obama has stated he will close Guantanamo Bay and ban torture by the American military, thus ending these atrocious human rights violations.

America's identity is not based on our strength, geography or form of government, but rather our adherence to principle. America represents the twin ideals of freedom and liberty; people have given their lives to preserve those ideals. Our actions at Guantanamo Bay have not met our own noble standards. Indeed, we have failed our founding principles and ourselves. These rights exist, not because we are American, but because we are human. Our inaction has been our action; our silence has spoken for us.

College Republicans; Constitutional rights for terrorists?

By Jerry Hale

Maulvi Abdul Ghaffar was a senior Taliban military leader prior to being captured in Afghanistan in December 2001. He was one of the 23 prisoners released from Camp Delta, a detention facility in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba in late January 2004. He then quickly rejoined the remnants of the Taliban until he was at last killed in a gunfight on Sept. 26, 2004. Abdullah Mehsud, the alleged mastermind of the kidnapping of two Chinese engineers (one of which was killed) in Pakistan's South Waziristan region was also released, returning to his position as an al-Qaida field commander. Mehsud also claimed responsibility for the bombing at Islamabad's Marriott Hotel in October 2004. The blast injured seven people, including a U.S. diplomat, two Italians and the Pakistani prime minister's chief security officer (AP 2004).

Struggling to understand this new type of war - one in which we must fight to defend our very way of life against terrorist extremists who have very little regard for even their own lives - the United States has made some serious mistakes in how they deal with prisoners of war. Maulvi Abdul Ghaffar and Abdullah Mehsud are two examples of weaknesses in the makeshift system that was devised to companion our efforts in the global war on terror. Rather than fill in the gaps that allowed for so many detainees to be released without conviction, political maneuvering and clashing world views lead to Boumediene v. Bush, a U.S. Supreme Court decision giving detainees at Guantanamo Bay the same rights as American citizens, to challenge their detention and to be tried in American courts under American law. Not only does this greatly limit the intelligence we can receive through interrogation, and not only does it appease terrorists who committed heinous crimes against our soldiers and allies, but it belittles our own Constitutional rights that we and our founding fathers have fought for by handing out those rights to terrorists who seek to take them from us.

To be fair, many advocates of the Boumediene v. Bush ruling simply desire the extension of basic human rights that we as Americans feel are endowed by our Creator to be afforded to all. Although most Americans share the view that all humans deserve basic respect and decent treatment, some disregard the unique and unprecedented type of war these terrorists engage in. It is very unwise to give too many courtesies to radical enemy combatants who believe that they will receive a great reward in the afterlife for taking innocent lives.

Some ignore or lack understanding of the gravity of the battle against terrorism and strike at the issue with a political hacksaw. Former Judge Advocate David Graham stated he counts himself "among those who have consistently rejected the idea that the U.S. is at 'war' with either radical Islamists or 'global terrorism.'" Any valid arguments on the legality of enemy combatants being afforded the Constitutional right to habeas corpus is here overshadowed by an ignorant claim that the War on Terror is fictional and that the threat of radical fundamentalists is invented by the Bush Administration. Instead of politically divisive arguments, ours should be a discussion of practical solutions to problems of the present and future. The question at hand is not simply one concerning how we treat terrorists, but how we treat our own Constitutional rights as Americans. That question is, "Do these non-citizens deserve the United States Constitutional right to Habeas Corpus?"

I adamantly insist that United States Constitutional rights legally must and morally should be preserved only for legal United States citizens and that only they may make an appeal to those rights. I do hold simultaneously the belief that all mankind are eligible to receive those God-given rights, if they act in accordance to the requirements that all U.S. citizens are under obligation to fulfill. We should strictly avoid any inhumane or degrading practice that would tarnish our own morality as well as our standing in the world scene. However, any concession or right afforded foreign enemy combatants must not fall under Constitutional rights, which are reserved for American citizens, whose rights for "life liberty and the pursuit of happiness" begin with the right to live.



Copyright Brigham Young University 19 Nov 2008